Modified Nikon PB-6 Bellows Units – Focusing Rail – Nodal Rail

The above unit is a standard Nikon PB-6 bellows unit which I have had for many years and it was excellent to use with the older manual focus Nikon lenses and also with the D-series auto focus lens for extreme close up images. It is not so easy to use with the current G-series lenses. My daughter has a couple of D-series lenses which I can use with it. These bellows have become a collectors item in recent years. The Bellows unit is superbly made and is a fine piece of machinery.

I have often thought that the rail from this Bellows unit would form the basis of an excellent, high quality focusing rail. I had been searching on Ebay for the last month and eventually found someone that was selling one of the tripod base units for this bellows for a few dollars. So I purchased it and now have an excellent multi purpose high quality combination of:

• Bellows Unit,
• Focusing Rail,
• and an excellent Nodal Rail.

All this for a few dollars outlay.

Above is the modified rail, which works very well and has a total movement range of around 370mm, with movement in both the the upper graduated rail and also the lower tripod attachment movement.

The adjustment is quite fine, as one full turn of the adjustment knob will move the rail around 27mm, so the rail can be adjusted accurately to less than 1mm.

I can look forward to some focus stacking images and some more accurately stitched panoramas in the near future.